Xanadu founder and CEO Christian Weedbrook says he was happy to have raised US$302-million in gross proceeds from the go-public process, which will help finance the company's plan to build a data centre powered by quantum computers by 2030.Eduardo Lima/The Canadian Press
Xanadu Quantum Technologies Ltd. XNDU-T stock had a strong trading debut on Friday, as Canada’s first technology company to go public since late 2021 encountered grisly market conditions.
Toronto-based Xanadu’s stock closed at US$11.50 on the Nasdaq, a day after closing its merger with publicly traded special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Crane Harbor Acquisition Corp., which went to market last year at $10 a share.
The gain compared favourably to overall markets, which extended losses from earlier in the week, including the Nasdaq index, which was down 2.1 per cent. Other publicly traded quantum stocks, including D-Wave Quantum Inc. QBTS-N, were down by between 5 per cent to 8 per cent on the day.
Xanadu ended the day with a market capitalization of more than US$3.4-billion. That makes Xanadu, which also cross-listed in Canada, one of the 10 most valuable technology companies on the Toronto Stock Exchange, worth more than stalwarts BlackBerry Ltd., Kinaxis Inc. and Lightspeed Commerce Inc.
Xanadu co-founder and chief executive officer Christian Weedbrook was in New York on Friday to ring Nasdaq’s opening bell. Afterward, he saw an image of himself along with his wife, infant son and early Xanadu employees from the bell-ringing displayed on a giant screen in Times Square, which he called a “pinch-me moment” during a midday interview.
Mr. Weedbrook said he hadn’t been tracking the stock’s first day performance. “I think you’d go crazy if you followed it too closely. I think it’s going well. I don’t really focus on things we don’t have much control over.”
At Friday’s close, Mr. Weedbrook’s 15.6-per-cent equity stake in Xanadu was worth US$534-million.
He said he was happy to have raised US$302-million in gross proceeds from the go-public process, which will help finance Xanadu’s plan to build a data centre powered by quantum computers by 2030.
Xanadu is one of several companies in a global race that features startups and giants, including Alphabet Inc. and International Business Machines Corp. They’re all working to harness the logic-defying rules of quantum physics in machines they hope will vastly outperform the world’s most powerful computers in several categories. That, in theory, should allow them to speed through sophisticated tasks such as complex economic forecasting, discovering advanced materials and pharmaceuticals – and, if used by bad actors, pick the cryptographic locks that protect global online systems.
There are several approaches to building quantum computers. Xanadu’s involves using light as its medium of calculation. That makes its system simpler and less costly than others to develop, as it dispenses with the need to keep its system ultracold, which is required for other systems, as Xanadu’s quantum effects occur at room temperature.
Xanadu has emerged as one of the nascent sector’s leaders. In the past five years, it has published four papers in the journal Nature documenting its scientific breakthroughs. In 2025, it advanced to the second stage of an international competition held by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency challenging quantum computer developers to prove their machines will work by 2033. Two other Canadian companies, Photonic Inc. and Nord Quantique Inc., are also in the running.